A service-level agreement is a contract that defines the technical support or business parameters that a service provider firm will provide its clients. The agreement typically spells out measures for performance and consequences for failure. In connection with packet-based data networks, a service-level agreement may define connectivity and availability parameters, such as minimum data rates and burst bit rates. Such service-level agreement parameters are difficult to measure or in some cases cannot be measured using existing technology. The present invention provides a system and method for calculating bit burst rates in packet-based data networks.